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Sweden’s Klarna: With U.S. Launch, It’s All About Online Payment ‘Friction’

Sep 19, 2014 12:27 pm ET

From Apple Pay to Google Wallet, major tech firms want a piece of the U.S. online-payments market, estimated to surpass $290 billion in revenue this year, about 9% of all the nation’s retail sales.

Enter Klarna, a Swedish company that will try its wings in the U.S. starting early next year. The company–which is tiny in comparison with some of its larger rivals–will face stiff competition, from behemoths like PayPal and billion-dollar upstarts like Stripe.